Letters: Much more to chancellor salary story than what was reported
Published: June 29, 2009
Much more to chancellor salary story than what was reported
Many newspapers recently ran an article by AP reporter Desiree Hunter about the Alabama Community College System’s proposed search for a new chancellor. Apparently it generated several editorials. I would like to clarify what happened regarding former Chancellor Roy Johnson’s pay raise.
In 2005, a committee of several state school board members (including Dr. Mary Jane Caylor) was appointed to make a recommendation for a salary increase for Johnson. Dr. Caylor presented what I thought was a very vague recommendation to the board (it had no precise amount of the total, which included deferred compensation). Justification offered for the large raise included a comment that if he didn’t get the raise, Johnson might leave us to accept the headship of AEA. All voted for it except Stephanie Bell and myself. When I explained my negative vote, I turned to Mr. Johnson to say that I was voting ”No” because the pay raise was excessive and sent a bad message to the taxpayers and would be better used in the classrooms.
A year later Stephanie Bell and I tried to pass a motion to fire Johnson but no one would vote with us. Later in the year there was a motion to put Johnson on administrative leave with pay. Bell and I were unsuccessful in our attempt to convince others to fire him without pay.
I agree with you that “we should weigh options, come to the best conclusion on what the new chancellor’s salary should be and pursue the best person for the job while keeping future pay raises to a minimum.” And yes, as you pointed out, that 2005 raise, which was recommended by the committee and presented by Dr. Caylor, did not work out very well. And two of us knew it would not.
Betty Peters
District 2 Representative
State Board of Education
Planned Parenthood key in prevention of unplanned pregnancy
With the recent murder of Dr. George Tiller, the issue of abortion has once again been thrust into the spotlight. Planned Parenthood knows that in order to reduce the need for abortion we must focus our efforts on the root of the problem – unintended pregnancy. Prevention is the key to reducing unintended pregnancies.
To prevent unintended pregnancies we should use common sense practices, such as ensuring that all people have access to affordable birth control and providing our youth with medically accurate, age appropriate comprehensive sex education.
Each year, Planned Parenthood provides approximately four million women, men and adolescents with the keys to prevention at our clinics around the nation. A recent study done by the Guttmacher Institute noted that between 2003 and 2007, teenagers were just as likely to have sex, but less likely to use contraception. The authors suggest that this is due to more than a decade of abstinence-only sex education programs, which have been proven ineffective by multiple studies. The American people are looking for a future guided by common sense solutions to the real problems we face.
No organization does more to prevent unintended pregnancies and the need for abortion than Planned Parenthood, and we hope that you will join in our work to increase access to affordable birth control and comprehensive sex education.
Jessica Seales
Alabama Field Organizer Planned
Parenthood of Alabama
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Reader Reactions
won’t should be want
Captain -
I still favor forced sterilization for men to sorry to pay their child support. You pay your child support no matter what happens to your financial situation. Sell your blood; sell all your possessions; sell your soul. But, you don’t fail to support your offspring. If you do, then you shouldn’t be allowed to have more. If having children were a right, then everybody would be able to have them. Infertility treatments would be free and gay people would be allowed to adopt children. Having children is not a right; therefore, forced sterilization is not unethical, draconian, or wrong. If a man knew he’d be receiving a vasectomy at state expense, I’ll guarantee he’d find the money to pay his obligations. If men don’t want to support their children under any and all circumstances then they should use a condom.
I’d be willing to concede your point on no-fault divorce, when we allow same sex couples to marry. We place barriers in the way of same sex couples but we allow heterosexuals to diminish the institution of marriage through easy to obtain divorces and drive-thru wedding chapels. It’s highly hypocritical to say we won’t to protect marriage when we allow heterosexuals to abuse it all the time.
The three ideas behind wtf’s comments trouble me.
First of all, while I do believe that many in the Corporate and neo-Conservative camps of the GOP do “use” the issue of abortion to gather votes from people that might normally be dis-inclined to vote against their interests, I’ve long found that most in the “pro-life” community are genuine in their care for children and women. Many certainly wish to prevent pregnancies, but unfortunately they’ve frequently relied on often false understandings of what comprehensive and age appropriate sex education provides.
Certainly there are a few outrageous examples yet the vast majority of sex education efforts are hardly handing out condoms and telling the kids to get busy. Abstinence certainly ought to be, and is I’d argue, a starting point for any program yet accepting that some children already are, or may soon be, sexually active is just common sense.
Parents that don’t wish their children to be exposed to the complete package of sex ed can opt out can’t they? As for this parent, I want my young teenager to know as much as he can. I guarantee he’d be more receptive to just about anyone but dear old Dad.
Also, Americans tend to be prudes about sex compared to most other nations and one consequence of this Puritanism is our extremely high teen pregnancy rates.
Surely the cultural warriors of the right do often scare their flocks, for to carry on the work of combating the evil secular humanists and the like requires donations. In an almost symbiotic relationship, the abstinence only sex education providers, often with close ties to the GOP, were also raking in funding while Congress was preventing anything beyond abstinence only programs.
Much of the instruction and curriculum preparation was done by the marginally qualified and this might have been the easiest money they’ve ever earned.
The results have been dismal and the kids consider the programs a joke but at least we’ve not offended James Dobson.
Secondly, wtf’s idea that we sterilize those that supposedly can’t support their current child is simply draconian.
Might their circumstances later changed? What if when they conceived they were financial sound? What if they lost their job due to the pregnancy? Do you see where I’m going here?
A foundation of the pro-choice movement is that a woman ought to control her own womb. The suggestion from wtf is more than just a slippery slope. Simply put, Constitutional and ethical issues are abundant.
furthermore, I also think many is society can live with the slight burdens created by caring for mothers with young children compared to the massive funding we provide for making war and especially how we often hand out Corporate welfare. Our health and human service agencies often do a fine job of working with difficult cases and even those where they can’t break the cycle of poverty don’t merit forced sterilizations.
Also, investing money in our children’s health and education is probably the best money we can spend as a society!
Lastly, Alabama doesn’t have “no fault” divorce. We do allow “incompatibility” to serve as a ground for divorce and that’s pretty much one of the happy couple saying “I can’t stand them and it ‘aint likely gonna change.“
However, would forcing one or both parents to remain under the same roof, or to maintain two separate homes while still remaining married, always be the best course of action for a child or children? If courting couples decide to do one of those “covenant marriages” then they can do this of course but let’s not force it on the mere mortals among us.
The process of divorcing for parents is slower than for the childless. Most areas do require parents with children seeking a divorce to receive some basic education on how to best parent in this next phase as the divorce is finalized. Our Courts are of course there to help, or change the terms, when the parents, or perhaps just one, need a little help, or just a kick in the rear, toward doing right by the child or children.
To close, Ms. Seales and Planned Parenthood are to be commended for their work.
Ms. Seales -
The anti-abortion folks don’t care if women and teen girls get pregnant. They just don’t want them to have abortions. So, they’ll show little to no interest in actually preventing pregnancy.
Our society professes to care about children. What a lie! If our society actually cared about children then parents who do not pay child support would be forcibly sterilized. If you are unable to provide support for the child you have, then you should not be allowed to create additional burdens on society by having more children.
If society actually cared about children then “no-fault” divorce would be illegal in all 50 States. We’ve been quite happy to amend state constitutions to prevent same sex marriages. If we truly want to protect marriage, the family, and children then why haven’t we eliminated “no-fault” divorce? I’ve written my state representative requesting such a change. Have any of you?
Of course not, because we don’t care about children. We only care about abortions.
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